In the Years Thereafter
by jj-chan
Summary: Dark x Riku, post series. Happily ever after is unlikely. But sometimes what you have can be enough. Warnings for wierdness and abuse of the English language. XD Very slightly edited.


If I owned DNAngel, Dark and Riku would be in their own little bubble of angst-free happiness, Daisuke/Satoshi would be very much canon, Risa would be loved by the storyline, and Krad would be reformed as my very own huggle-plushie. X3 Any of that happening right now?

Krad: No, but you are hallucinating rather badly. ((fireball))

I didn't think so. No explicit spoilers here, and I made some stuff up. Oh well, on with the fanfic.

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**In the Years Thereafter**

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_RETURN ..._

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When he came back it was with a bang, startling her and everyone else by his sudden reappearance after a year because everyone had been thinking that he was _gone_, forever.

He had his own body now, though this fact was significant only to a precious few. How and why, he didn't say, though it was not from lack of asking.

Everyone had questions, and he answered some, but to others, he grinned and sealed his lips, pretending to zipper them shut. And everything was happening again, except the one with white wings had gone and the police's young commander had no interest in it anymore.

But he was just the same as ever, brash and cocky and arrogant and perverted, smug smirk back in place because he thought she didn't know anything, at least not about him and the white demon and her twin and her grandmother and her first love.

But she did know, and to her surprise she didn't hate him any more than she already did, because everything was almost alright and she understood why, mostly, and she didn't judge him.

Until one night when he was being especially unbearable – it had been a horrible day watching her first love and her twin get back together, but it didn't hurt as much as she thought – and she found herself spilling it all, everything, along with angry words and accusing glares and the occasional strangled sob.

It would have been alright had she not seen the look he gave her before he reached out and put his arms around her, tightly.

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_...TO LIVE ..._

-

Life became even more complicated after that night. But something had been started, or maybe just revealed in the open for both of them to see.

Time passed, like it always does. And everything changes.

She got older, body maturing, blossoming, but he was still the same, changing only the look in his eyes, the curve of his lips.

They got married eventually, happy and uncaring of the consequences, or simply ignoring them in their bliss.

And they moved in together, maintaining some semblance of normalcy, especially after he put on a wig in public and found a day job.

They still got into arguments, into fights and sulks, she threw some household items at him, and he stormed out more than once. They usually made up after, though there were still hurts and secrets and little resentments between them.

She grew older still while he never changed outwardly, and her insecurities grew as she looked upon his still-young form. She worried that he might not want her, as time wore on. She started pushing him away, until he put an end to that.

But her hair was losing its red, her skin sank into wrinkles, her muscles were shrinking and her breasts began to sag. People were noticing how the husband never seemed to age.

Soon they had to move away, and receive fewer and fewer visitors, and they needed stage makeup handy for him, to dull his eyes and line his skin, in addition to everything else he applied to conceal his identity.

She wanted him to leave and be young, but he was firm. She always asked him why he wanted to stay with her, and his replies were brief and to the point. He loved her, and it was that simple.

He told her he wasn't leaving unless she looked him in the eye and told him that she didn't love him, and wanted him to go, to leave her.

He never left.

He was a demon, an angel, but she was only human and all humans die eventually. They have to.

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_...TO LOSE ..._

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She lifted her hand to where his was, cupped against her cheek, eyes glazed and incoherent, and told him, lost somewhere in her childhood, to stop crying like an idiot, if he had a problem bad enough to make himself cry, he'd better go and solve it.

He shook his head no, but she was already drifting somewhere else, here and there, at one time vaguely surprised to see her vibrant red hair half-faded to grey.

He saw it the moment before she went, her eyes clear and questioning, looking straight into his. Saying no words, telling everything, and he felt himself answering right back, hiding nothing.

She asked him one last time, and he answered as always, but this time it was different because she finally accepted it.

He smiled through his tears and held her tight as she faded and left him alone again.

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_... AND FADE ..._

-

He was disconsolate, and deeply in despair. He refused to attend the funeral, refused to leave the house and those who knew left him alone, understanding and knowing it was better for fewer people to see him.

But he still refused to eat, and yelled and glared and told people to do anatomically impossible feats before slamming down the phone and burying his face in his hands.

He had loved and lost before but he'd stopped it before it could grow, before he could sink too deep to live happily again had he lost it, and the woman had understood. She did too, and tried to avoid it but it was too late, he was lost without her, the pain in his chest almost too much to bear.

He slept in her bed because it still held faint traces of her, hating clichés because memories weren't enough, couldn't ever be enough.

It was when plates started crashing through his grip, when doorknobs wouldn't turn in his hands, when he started sinking a few inches into the floor, did he realize that he was fading, though appearances said otherwise.

When his shirts began to fall through him he simply curled up on her bed, breathing in her almost-gone scent, because though memories weren't enough, they were still something and he wanted anything the world could give.

As he started to go, finally, little bits of stardust floating in the air, he wondered and hoped that maybe, wherever he was going, she would be there and waiting for him, vibrant and fiery and probably angry at what he had let himself become after she'd left.

The thought made him smile.

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_... MAYBE TO ETERNITY._

-

A person went to the cemetery one day, a girl with shining chocolate eyes and unruly red hair and a trowel grasped firmly in one hand.

She knelt by a grave, preparing to dig up weeds that had sprung up and was surprised to see that they weren't just ugly creepers or common grass but a plant she'd seen once before, growing by an old dilapidated house her father used to gaze at sadly.

Violet blooms, twinkling back at her in an old familiar way.

She left them there and walked back home unaffected, because she didn't believe the silly, farfetched tale of winged demons and holy maidens, because her brother was sixteen and perfectly normal – and pretended that she didn't almost feel the slight breeze, like swift wings flying past, didn't almost hear a mouth opening in an indignant yell for help, only to be silenced by another's soft lips.

Because it hadn't ended happily after all.

She didn't want to think that it was true because even if it was, the flowers couldn't mean anything much, but then she'd start hoping that somewhere out there, something like forever did exist – and believing in that would make her naïve and vulnerable.

She missed the scratch on the epitaph, but she probably would have dismissed it as a vandal's work, mocking words left in stone, barely distinguishable and making no sense whatsoever.

Back in the cemetery, though, a few naïve people would say that it looked all the much better for the vines covering what had once been bare stone, stark and alone. Now, it was against an embrace of green and violet, a lot less lonely, brighter and cheerier and looking almost perfectly beautiful.

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_You really didn't have to stay, Dark…_

_-_

**It Never Really Ends With the Happily Ever After**

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((pokes at the few readers who've survived the crap-athon))

_Hi! Hope you enjoyed it. XD the question Riku asks, the meaning of the plants (if any), and the etched words are whatever you think they are._

_First attempt at stuff like this… I can't believe I finished it in three and a half hours straight. This is the end of it, but there's always room for crappy little drabbles/one-shots containing specific events that happened somewhere in between. _

_Please review, ne? Comments, suggestions, flames, criticisms and most importantly, recommendations of Dark/Riku fan-anythings (including your own) are accepted with a heartfelt smile._

- much love, jj -


End file.
